This article explains the processes to conduct an audit of your services.

Business phones and communication services are essential tools for employees; however, many departments are unaware of how many active services they have or their exact locations. Therefore, there are three parts of a thorough Business Communications Services Audit:

1. Active Department Coordinators - Managing who has access to your department's telecom service management is vital.
2. Service Costs - Understanding the cost of your services will help you view your bill and check your call details. Refer to the ComTech Services Rates table. 
3. Service Location - Accurate records of phone locations are critical to maintaining the E911 database.  E911 is a service that automatically displays the telephone number and physical location of the 911 caller on the emergency operator's screen. Unlike Basic 911 service, the distressed caller must tell the operator their location.

• For example, a person in distress and unable to speak dials 911 from their office VoIP phone. The Public Safety Answering Point receives the E911 location information as 123 Main Street, HR Department, port 16. Once the emergency team arrives on site, they find that nothing is wrong there. However, since the phone's location was never updated, where is the distressed caller?
  • Please see the FCC website for more information about VoIP and E911.

Active Department Coordinators

The best way to determine who the Active Department Coordinator is for your department is to use the ComTech Coordinator Search Tool. The list is populated in real-time so that changes made to PCR are reflected immediately.

• ComTech Coordinator Search Tool 
  
  • Enter a Department OUC to identify all active coordinators in that department.
    OR
  • Enter a user's Unity ID to identify all active coordinators in that user's assigned department.

Note: If you are working remotely (off-campus), you'll need to be connected to the VPN for this tool to work.

 Export to CSV 

1. On the Home page of Customer Center, in the Department Services & Equipment section, make sure the Search field is blank.
2. Click Export to CSV and choose All Data.
   
3. The list will download, and you should see it in your Downloads folder. 
   

4. Click to download and open the list in Excel.
5. You can sort and filter the list like any other spreadsheet. In the next section, we'll explore some options.
   
   

Conduct an Audit

• Filter Column A (Type) to show only Equipment and then hide or delete those rows. 
• Sort the list to show the Services in A to Z order on Column C (Catalog).
• If you have more than one department, choose Customer Sort, then Sort by Column D (Owner), and then Add Level > Sort by Column C (Catalog).
• Freeze Row 1.
• Verify all phone lines (VoIP) are associated with the correct person in Column F (Reference). For example, conference rooms, reception areas, and similar spaces may be noted as 'com.'
• Verify that all phone lines (VoIP) have the correct information in Column G (Location). Remember that phones are tied to phone numbers. Moving phones without updating the E911 database record is irresponsible. Always put in a Change Request!
• Check whether you have Long Distance Authorization Codes. 
  
  • If so, make sure they are associated with a person. 
  • The Location column might be empty if the Code isn't restricted to a specific number.
  • If you don't know who the Code(s) belong to, send an email to your department with a screenshot (as shown above) listing the last three digits of the code (s). Please notify everyone to claim any codes that belong to them by a specific date. I'd suggest a week or so. After that, all unclaimed codes should be removed from your active services. There is no charge to remove them, and no charge to order new ones. The only charge for an Auth Code is the long-distance charge incurred when the code is used to make long-distance calls. 
• Make notes in Column H for any change request work that needs to be done. 
• Use the current bill to verify your services are being charged correctly.

If you need assistance, email Alice Thurman - akthurm2@ncsu.edu.